Important note on the Zivkovic Lexan mask

[DHCJr]

Thank you, Barry. One of the biggest problems with the U.S. society is the National Past Time. It is NOT Baseball, it is sue whoever you can. If you take off a top from your coffee to put in creamer and surgar and don't put the top back on properly and get burned, you sue the person who sue the company who sold you the coffee. If your adoptive child gets in trouble with the police, you sue the adoption agency and the company you worked for because they transfered you to another country and you uprooted the child.

If someone gets injured with a Lexan mask here in the U.S., there will be a line of lawyers waiting to sue, the manufacturer, the vendor, the FIE, the USFA, the organizer, the referee, their opponent and the Armorer. If they changed the visor, improperly, that will be even more ammunition. Maybe they will loose, but juries seem to want them to win, because maybe next time it will be them to get millions. Even if they loose, I can't afford the time and expense.

We not only confiscate the mask for the duration of the tournament, we make sure it is never used again. We can not crush it, because they would sue we are destroying private property. We do mark it very visably FAILED in the largest letters on the bib and anywhere else.

I have been the Armorer at a tournament where 2 masks have failed ON THE STRIP. Neither caused injury, both were non-FIE masks, both were Foil, both were from flicks and both got caught in the mesh.

I have worked as Head Armorer at some tournaments, where an assistant Armorer passed a mask, that shouldn't have been passed. Luckily, I caught some of them, but how many did I miss. I can't check every mask.

I can't imangine a wired mask having catastrophic failure over a large area, that wouldn't be caught. I can see it with a visor mask. While watching Sabre, at the Olympics on television, I really wasn't able to see the eyes. They also whipped off their masks after each touch. I don't see where it helps us with television and isn't that why the FIE Executive Committee is mandating it.

Thank you Bran and Barry, you both gave me information I can use in checking a mask.

[Alex_Paul]

Originally Posted by Purple Fencer

The only parties served are the manufacturers, not the fencers.

To be honest we hate making our lexan masks, they are hand made by Barry Paul as no one else is skilled enough and we make no money on them!

There is no way you will get a test that will work on the Lexan in masks that does not damage the mask and exacerbate the risk so you are left with 2 options:
1 Use your common sense, If the lexan is badly scratched or does not look secure take the mask till the end of the comp or remove the scratched visor.
2 Refuse all of them in protest against the FIE.

In the UK the safety standards have been much higher than the USA for many years. We have insisted on 350N clothing and masks for some time now and the rules will insist on FIE plastrons for all electric competitions next year. High standards mean that we see almost no dangerous masks or anything else presented at comps. I personally don't see the need to test the lexan, you don't test the material of the jacket over the heart or the bib which protects the thoat.

[Purple Fencer]

Originally Posted by DHCJr

If someone gets injured with a Lexan mask here in the U.S., there will be a line of lawyers waiting to sue, the manufacturer, the vendor, the FIE, the USFA, the organizer, the referee, their opponent and the Armorer. If they changed the visor, improperly, that will be even more ammunition. Maybe they will loose, but juries seem to want them to win, because maybe next time it will be them to get millions. Even if they loose, I can't afford the time and expense.

Not to mention the impact on every salle in the US. We already have a hard enough time convincing people we don't have real points or sharp edges on our blades, or that we're a VERY safe sport.

It doesn't matter that the overall track record is fantastic, or that Smirnov's death was 20 + years ago or that current gear was improved because of his death, or that the fatality from last year was the fencer's fault for not wearing the proper safety gear...or that we as fencers understand the risks and willingly take them on. If there's a major injury in the States due to the failure of a lexan mask there will be a legal feeding frenzy.

Remember, this is a country that has a medical warning "may cause drowsiness" on a bottle of sleeping pills.

[achilleus]

Originally Posted by Bran

Yes, our masks are FIE approved and have been for quite some time. You must at least know that we were the first to design them as well as receive FIE approval? Please read: http://www.zivkovic.com/about.jsp

So the fencing community can blame you for the existence of those masks? I'm not so sure I would be proud of that...

Even though I hate those things, I gotta say thanks for posting information on the board. It's great getting useful info from the source.

[Inquartata]

Originally Posted by Alex_Paul

2 Refuse all of them in protest against the FIE.

I would pay money to support this option. Sign a petition in support of the armourers doing it. Carry a protest sign in solidarity. Whatever!

If anyone has the brass ones to stare down Roch it is some of the armourers I've met.

[KD5MDK]

You might agree that having a Lexan shield on a fencing mask would be completely useless if it could only withstand one hit? As such, this was taken into consideration during the approval process.

Thank you for your response. I asked because the test you described seemed clearly aimed at indicating that a single blow was unlikely to penetrate a mask, and while accepting that, I wondered at the repeated blows scenario, especially as I'm unfamiliar with the mechanical properties of Lexan.

[Bran]

Originally Posted by achilleus

So the fencing community can blame you for the existence of those masks? I'm not so sure I would be proud of that...

Even though I hate those things, I gotta say thanks for posting information on the board. It's great getting useful info from the source.

Wow. What an incredibly rude thing to say.

Please enlighten me - what is there not to be proud of?

[Bran]

Alex, thank you for stepping in and helping to clarify some aspects of the Lexan mask.

DHCJr, I hope that we have helped you (and any reader of fencing.net) understand a little more about the Lexan mask. Again, there is no specific test like the punch test for mesh, so it really comes down to checking a few details.

Again, however, I would contact the FIE for further information - maybe they have some that Alex and I missed. You may also want to ask about the possibility of developing a more rigid test for armorers.

[Bran]

One more comment:

Fencing, like every other sport, is risky. Heck, being a spectator in golf can be dangerous sometimes. Accidents and injuries, despite all precautionary measures, do happen. If you can't accept that then I would suggest not getting out of bed.

[Craig]

Bran,

I think he is referring to the feeling some have against the lexan masks.

Craig

[achilleus]

Bran,

No disrespect intended, but I hate those things, and as Craig mentioned above, you must realize that they are not popular in the fencing community. I mean, when they were mandatory, people refused to wear them. Then they offered prize money to those who wore them, and still no one wore them. And they still haven't been approved by the certain committees for the point weapons.

In sabre it's required, but even the sabre fencers complain of the lack of breathability, weight, and blind spot...

I'm all for innovation in the sport but these don't seem to be an improvement yet.

Again, thanks for the useful information. If I have to wear one, I'll feel a little safer.

[Purple Fencer]

I wonder if a different kind of test probe can't be developed.

The current ones, of course, can't be used because there's no mesh to tryh and go through, but how about something like a spring-loaded center punch?

You'd need the nose of the probe itself to be someting like a hard rubber foot the size of an epee tip and a spring strongh enough to put a sufficient amount of force on the lexan (not to mention it'd be difficult as hell to push down)...AND I'd hate for divisions and armorers to invest in such a specialized piece of equipment....but it could be developed.

That wouldn't affect the issue of retaining FIE status is the lexan was changed, but at least you could test the thing.

[Larrison]

Hmm.. there might be a couple of other ways to test them?

If you're looking for micro cracking, can you do it via either a polarized light test (depends upon the specific materials, I'd guess) -- you put the lexan under a specific stree (like weighting one end) and look for stress rings or concentrations in the material?

or end illuminating it with a laser, and looking for sparkles back from a crack? (the light ought to propagate down the lexan and not escape, unless there's a crack in the way -- again depending upon the material)

The aerospace industry uses a dye penetration test, but I'd hate to try to use something like that -- but you might have a wipe on, wait 10 seconds, wipe off surface dye, that would only be held in a crack and visible under UV light. Then you might be able to avoid surface discoloration.

In the longer term --there's been some interesting work in laying fibers with matching refractive indexes into a plastic resin as its molded. This has been suggested as a very strong and transparent material for motorcycle face shields, bulletproof glass and aircraft windows. This *might* be a long term better material as it would potentially be fail-safe. But it's only in the R&D phase that I know of.

Lastly, there's putting some type of sensing element actually in the lexan. I'm thinking off the top of my head -- but there's been some work in putting very think microscopic wires in a layer in the middle of a plastic sheet, and then if the sheet cracks you could pick up the crack by a break in the electrical conductivity. Or something similar looking at the capacitance using a very thin transparent conducting layer (sprayed aluminum for example) -- but that might darken the plastic somewhat.

These are all very blue sky ideas and would require a bit of work to test out -- something you might give a college senior engineering class as a project to look at. I'm not even sure of the properties of Lexan? Does the stress build up until you start crack propagation? or does it only start a crack once you exceed a critical threshold, and then just continue to propagate after that? How big of a crack is serious, before crack propagation under a typical fencing "hit" starts to be a concern? (If we know that, then we can scope how detailed the test has to be...)

Thinking through this -- this really might be an interesting college level engineering project or senior thesis for someone.

[Bran]

Originally Posted by Craig

Bran,

I think he is referring to the feeling some have against the lexan masks.

Craig

Craig, that would be obvious.

I am asking him to explain WHY he claims (on behalf of the "fencing community" no less) the mask is not something to be proud of. Surely, there must be a reason if he is so violently against the mask.

That is what I'm after.

[CvilleFencer]

Originally Posted by Bran

Craig, that would be obvious.

I am asking him to explain WHY he claims (on behalf of the "fencing community" no less) the mask is not something to be proud of. Surely, there must be a reason if he is so violently against the mask.

That is what I'm after.

Well, I can't speak for Achilleus, but I can tell you why I dislike them:

Weight: I have yet to see one (and granted I have not seen them all) that has a good feeling to it and that is not substantially heavier than my preferred mask (LP comfort fit FIE).

Blind Spot: I have not worn one in competition, but in trying them on I notice that my eyes have trouble tracking with my peripheral vision anything that gets near the frame. This bugs me a lot and in my short experience, tends to give me headaches (as my eyes try to focus on two things at different distances at once) but I will grant that with time I may get used to it.

Breathability: That big lexan shield takes up a ton of frontal area that you would normally be able to suck air through. You can conduct all the air flow test you want in which the science says the air flow is not impacted, but my brain tells me otherwise (granted I tend to be just a bit claustrophobic).

Safety: Well talked about here in other posts.

Durability: Scratches and chips that require the replacement of a component that cost almost as much/more than a whole new non-visored mask.

Cost: Ungodly expensive for no benefits whatsoever to the fencer, or at least that is the perception.

Their being mandatory: Like it or not they are associated with cockroach and his changes to fencing, which for many of us is starting off with a strike against them. The fact that they are now talking about requiring, as in you can't fence without, this expensive, heavy, potentially unsafe, uncomfortable thing that the vast majority of fencers do not want/like/feel comfortable/safe in does not sit well with most of us.

Limited availability: You can get these from LP, Zivkovic, Duelist, Negrinni and who else? I have a wealth of options in a standard or even an FIE mask that are not available in this type of mask. And did I mention that they are just ridiculously expensive?

Fogging: Again, I have not competed in one of these things, but I have done a fair amount of diving and paintball in my time and I have yet to find a mask system that did not fog up on me... and those did not cover my mouth! Sweat splatters, fogging, fingerprints, optical distortion, glare, these are all things that leave me feeling that these things are a horrible idea.

I may have missed a few things, but the short version is that while being the company that invented these thrice cursed things that are now being made mandatory might not lead to a pack of fencers dragging you down a dark alley from which you will never return, you still may want to hold off bragging about it from a "don't tease the animals" sort of precaution!

[Bran]

Originally Posted by achilleus

Bran,

No disrespect intended, but I hate those things, and as Craig mentioned above, you must realize that they are not popular in the fencing community. I mean, when they were mandatory, people refused to wear them. Then they offered prize money to those who wore them, and still no one wore them. And they still haven't been approved by the certain committees for the point weapons.

In sabre it's required, but even the sabre fencers complain of the lack of breathability, weight, and blind spot...

I'm all for innovation in the sport but these don't seem to be an improvement yet.

Again, thanks for the useful information. If I have to wear one, I'll feel a little safer.

I'm sorry, but saying the entire "fencing community" is against the mask is just plain silly. You do not speak on its behalf.

You "hate" the mask, but still haven't said - for your own personal reasons - why. Only "they said", "they said".... Who said?

Have you picked one up before and tried fencing with one? If so, then you should be qualified to have an opinion and I'd like to hear it. If you haven't then you should not be making blanket statements.

I wonder - how did putting on a mesh wire mask and picking up a weapon for the first time feel? Let me guess - for you it felt completely normal. And I am sure the never was any kind of problem of weight, breathing, and blind spot with any other traditional mask? Only for the transparent mask, right?

Please.

Simply put, it takes time to adjust to sporting equipment, old and new.

Some customers have come back to us about the fogging. We try to tell them to use the anti-fogging solution and adjust their breathing downward more. Once they can train themselves to adjust their breathing then they are fine.

Incidentally, at the IFA Championships at the end of February Sada and Emily Jacobsen were both wearing the mask. And this past weekend at the Arnold Fencing Classic Ivan Lee was wearing the mask. They did not have to, but they did. Does that mean anything to you?


Bran Zivkovic

[CvilleFencer]

Originally Posted by Bran

Incidentally, at the IFA Championships at the end of February Sada and Emily Jacobsen were both wearing the mask. And this past weekend at the Arnold Fencing Classic Ivan Lee was wearing the mask. They did not have to, but they did. Does that mean anything to you?

Hmmm, it could mean that they are some of the very small percentage of fencers that have to fence in the things for most of their tourneys so thay may as well get used to them as best they can rather they like them or not? Sorry, couldn't resist...

[telkanuru]

It means he likes not having a chunk of target on his face...

[KD5MDK]

We've reintroduced the head parry in sabre...